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every temper, every action, into fubjection to the laws and conformity with the example of your Lord; to love God above all things, and man, in the next place, for the fake of God; and to manifeft the ftedfastness and fervency of your love to God and man by uniform and unequivocal deeds, by living to the glory of your heavenly King and the good of your fellowcreatures; then may you humbly confide that you are at present one of the people of God; then may you regard yourself as entitled by the mercy of Chrift to apply to your own comfort the promises of the Gospel. Remember, however, the ground on which you ftand. ftand. Remember that, if your obedience begins to flag; if a worldly spirit gains ftrength in your bofom; exactly in the fame proportion your title to comfort is undermined. The righteoufness of the righteous fhall not deliver him in the day of his tranfgreffion. When the righteous turneth from his righteousness and committeth iniquity; he shall even die thereby. Remember that when St. Paul befeeches God to comfort the hearts of the Theffalonians, that petition is connected with a fecond prayer indifpenfable to the fuccefs of the former; that He would establish them

in every good word and work. Bleed are they faith our Saviour, by the mouth of St. John, almost as it were clofing the volume of Scripture with the momentous warning; blessed are they that do his commandments, that they may have a right to the tree of life (1). Brethren! remain stedfast in obedience. So fhall the God of hope fill with all joy and peace in believing, that ye may abound in hope through the power "of the Holy Ghoft (m).

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(1) Rey. xxii. 14.

(m) Rom. xv. 13.

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I am troubled; I am bowed down greatly; I go mourning all the day long.

THE eyes of the mind, no less than

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thofe of the body, are incompetent to fuftain, without being dazzled and bewildered, a fudden tranfition from darkness to light. The objects which float before them, new, dimly viewed, imperfectly. comprehended, are divefted of their proper fhapes, their native colours, their genuine dimensions, their wonted accompaniments, their obvious use and application; and not unfrequently prefent themfelves as gigantic phantoms, arrayed in imaginary terrors. It is only by collecting the powers which Providence has implanted,

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planted, by exercifing them with difcretion, by gradually rendering them familiar with unaccustomed scenes, by reforting to appropriate means for ftrengthening their debility and rectifying their errors, that the recently awakened organ learns to judge, to discriminate, to understand; to appreciate the various fubjects of its contemplation; to direct them to the ends which they are feverally calculated to anfwer; to invite affiftance and to derive confolation from every quarter whence by the appointment of Heaven the bleffings may be obtained; and, while it distinguishes between real and fancied dangers, and fedulously guards against perils actually fupervening, to difmifs groundless alarm.

When perfons who have lived not unto Chrift who died for them, but unto themfelves; whether immerfed in the groffness of open vice, abforbed in the cares of the world, funk in fluggish indifference, or refting on punctilioufnefs of moral decorum; when fuch perfons by the effectual application of the word of God, by fickness, by adverfity, by the lofs of a dear friend or relative, or by fome equally feasonable operation of the visiting hand of

Omnipotence,

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Omnipotence, are roufed from their fpiritual lethargy: when they perceive that their life has been a fhadow, a dream, a childish play, a tiffue of duties neglected and wilful tranfgreffions: when they furvey the holiness and the juftice of God whom they have defpifed, and see themfelves fufpended by the thread of mortality over the abyfs of eternal condemnation: it is not unusual for their terror and dejection to fettle into the bitterness of despondence. The curfes of the broken law, the thunders of inevitable vengeance, found inceffantly in their ears. Before their eyes the books are opened: and the long catalogue of their fins written in the books overwhelms them with agonifing difmay. Groaning under the anguish experienced by the afflicted Pfalmift, but deftitute of the gleam of comfort which, in the humble consciousness of penitence, he ventured to cherish; they are troubled, they are bowed down greatly, they go mourning all the day long. The arrows of the Lord ftick faft in them; and His hand presseth them fore. There is no foundness in their Alefb becaufe of His anger; neither is there any reft in their bones because of their fin. For their iniquities are gone over their head;

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